Date Night

DATES WITH THEMES

Let’s kick off the new year with themed dates for January’s celebrations!

POPCORN DAY

National Popcorn Day is Jan. 19, and we can’t think of a better way to pay homage to this “holiday” than to visit Popculture, with locations in Parkville and Overland Park. They serve up some of the best popcorn around, with more than 40 different flavors available for taste testing and purchase. Savory flavors include chili lime, dill pickle and loaded potato, as well as traditional butter and cheese. Cheesecake, cinnamon toast and Dr. Pepper are just some of their sweet flavors, along with traditional caramel and cinnamon. I’ll admit that it’s hard to restrain yourself when doing the taste testing, as they have so many flavors to choose from. But I always gravitate toward the savory, with barbecue and cheese being my favorites. Dean likes a little bit of everything—savory and sweet. In addition to popcorn, Popculture also features about 16 flavors of ice cream from the Ice Cream Club. It, too, is delicious!

TEA MONTH

In honor of National Tea Month, we recently enjoyed the prix fixe lunch in the tea room at Andre’s. This meal comes with an entree, two sides, a roll, a drink and a mini dessert. The entrees we chose were the ham and cheese croissant and the chicken salad with sides of mixed greens and tomatoes. It was all delicious, but the real stars of the meal were the hot tea and the desserts. I opted for the raspberry tea with the chocolate raspberry pastry, which was layers of chocolate cake and chocolate buttercream with raspberry preserves. My hubby got the green tea with citrus and gingko paired with the vanilla square, which was yellow cake and vanilla bean buttercream topped with fondant. Their tea is from Harney & Sons and is some of the best I have had anywhere—and the desserts were to die for.

HAPPINESS WEEK

Hunt for Happiness Week is the third full week in January, so Dean and I made a list of several things that make us happy and planned mini dates around them. Our list included serving, giving, being outside, sunsets and breakfast food. We started out our week by taking an evening to watch the sunset at a lookout spot close to our house. Next up was helping with an outdoor food distribution at our church on a beautiful, sunny Saturday, followed by an evening around our fire pit. We also handed out $5 Walmart gift cards to random customers at the store, and we gave some extra produce to our next door neighbors. Finally, we enjoyed several of our favorite breakfast foods together at home, including baked oatmeal, oven pancakes, barley breakfast bowls and cinnamon apple quinoa. Each of these things put a smile on our faces, but it’s the things we do for others that make us the happiest.

Hannah Berry is a freelance writer who lives in the Northland with her husband. They love to explore Kansas City and try new restaurants and activities.

FOR GREAT DATE NIGHT IDEAS STARTING WITH A-Z, HEAD TO KCPARENT.COM!